Marc Roelshttp://www.marcroels.nl
Personal blogMon, 21 Jul 2014 16:43:44 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.5.15Structure and Logichttp://www.marcroels.nl/structure-and-logic/
http://www.marcroels.nl/structure-and-logic/#respondSat, 21 Jul 2012 12:35:46 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=485I always wondered how the Problem Solution Consequences structure matches with logic. The reason is that, at first sight, it doesn’t really seem to align. What you would expect is that the case you are making, ie the solution, would be the conclusion of your meta-argument, with your arguments being the premises that, when true, necessarily lead to your solution being true. There are two problems with that. The first is that while premises in the logical structure work closely together, are even dependent on each other. Consequences appear to be independent of each other. You can have positive and negative consequences and still feel the solution is “true”. I say “true”, because the second problem is that there isn’t really a necessary truth coming from consequences, or at least not one that is obvious. Most policy solutions have positive and negative consequences. They also often have nuances and other difficulties that don’t really seem to sit well with formal logic. And then I haven’t even discusses the role of ‘the problem’ in this structure yet. Well, in this post I will try to tackle all three issues and try to marry the powerful PSC structure with formal logic.

Working together: If we look at the traditional logical argument example: C: Aristotle is mortal, P1: Aristotle is a man, P2: All men are mortal. Then what we are looking at is what I would like to call sequential argumentation. What we do in sequential argumentation is to build a logical pyramid that supports the conclusion. First you have your conclusion, which is supported by premises, then you support these premises by further premises, etc. This pyramid is on the one hand very strong, but also very unstable. It is very strong, because the conclusion can be based on a very deep argumentation line, giving it argumentative strength. All the sub-sub-sub premises work together to ultimately support the main conclusion. However, if you can show that one of the premises, or one of its sub-sub premises is false, then the whole argumentative pyramid falls as a house of cards. The reason is that in this case if one of the premises is false, necessarily the conclusion must be false also. For example, suppose we support P1: Aristotle is a man, by arguing that “Man by definition is a rational creature” and “Aristotle is rational”. Now suppose someone could somehow show us that Aristotle isn’t rational, then by this logical pyramid, he isn’t a man and therefore isn’t mortal. Thus the conclusion is false, or at least the conclusion isn’t necessarily true.

This is for example how skeptics in philosophy deny us access to an objective truth. They go down the argumentative pyramid deep enough to find a premise that we cannot know for sure and therefor say we cannot say a certain claim is necessarily true.

There is, fortunately, a way of arguing, that (at least in real life) will prevent the weakness of the sequential argument. This I would call parallel argumentation. It is best explained with an example. Suppose I want to argue the conclusion that C: I wasn’t at the Zoo yesterday. I could support that by saying: P1: I don’t like going to the zoo, or P2: The Zoo was closed yesterday, or P3: I was abroad yesterday, or P4: I’m forbidden from going to the Zoo. Now some of these premises aren’t that strong, others are, but the good thing is, that even if one of the premises is proven false, the other premises are still valid and independently are able to support the conclusion. Even if only P3 is true, then it still necessarily follows that the conclusion is true.

Now the observant reader will have noticed that I left out all the hidden premises. If we would add those hidden premises (try it for yourself), then you would see that all the premises are actually different arguments that share the same conclusion. So what happens is that instead of having one argumentative pyramid, you now have several. If you collapse one of the pyramids, then the others are still standing strong, making it much more difficult to show that your conclusion is false. Parallel and sequential argumentation or not mutually exclusive. Each parallel argument is ultimately in itself a sequential argument, or could have parallel sub argumentation contained, which then ultimately lead to sequential sub-argumentation. This way we can build lovely intricate and complex arguments. Which we don’t have time for in an actual debate anyway, but it’s good to know. The reason parallel argumentation is so difficult to refute is why in debating you should always aim for parallel argumentation. That way, if your opponent disproves one of your arguments, your whole case doesn’t fall apart.

There is a school of thought in modern debating that says that one beautifully thought out sequential argument is more convincing than three superficial parallel arguments (given time restraints, you need to choose between width and depth). I agree to some extent, but it carries a big risk. It makes refutation much easier than in the case of parallel argumentation. So unless you are very confident about that single argument, I wouldn’t go for it. And it’s definitely not suitable for the beginner.

Necessary truth?: So how do consequences lead to the necessary, or at least the likely truth of your solution? The problem is that consequences do not have your solution as their conclusion. Take the case: “The death penalty should be abolished”. One of the consequences of the death penalty is that invariably an innocent person will be sentenced to die. In that argument the solution is not the conclusion of your argument. The conclusion of your argument/consequence is the consequence itself: “Invariably an innocent person will be sentenced to die if the death penalty is in force”, the premises support that the consequence exists. So in order for parallel argumentation to support your solution, we need a level of argumentation between the solution and the consequences. There is an implicit argument that does this: C: we should implement this solution, P1-5: there are positive consequences (1-5), P6: whichever solution has the most positive consequences should be implemented. Or alternatively, P6 : whichever solution for which the positive consequences outweigh the negative consequences should be implemented. Potentially this could lead to a whole new level of argumentation that the opponent could challenge. Fortunately P6 is so ingrained in our thinking (it makes sense after all) that it is almost never challenged. That is why the Problem, Solution, Consequences structure is so powerful. It is based on a generally accepted meta-structure and forces you to use parallel argumentation.

Problem: But how about the problem. How does that fit into all of this. Well it fits into the debate in two ways. The removal of your problem is going to be the biggest consequence in your case. But that doesn’t explain why we mention it before the solution. The second reason does that and this second reason is that the problem also serves to justify the relevance of the debate. This is however technically a different debate. You can accept the solution as being true, but still consider it an irrelevant topic to discuss. So in that sense the problem, logically, is not part of your structure. It has no function, other than convincing your audience that this is an important subject to discuss. The PMC structure thus gives you two conclusions: 1) this solution is worthy of debate, 2) the solution should be implemented. Therefore my suggestion in previous posts that you should never spend too much time on the problem. Its only use is to get people’s attention. The moment you’ve gotten that, move on.

This explanation is my own and a bit of a hobby subject, but then again so is this entire blog. If you have any other theory on this subject I would be very interested to know. Hope you enjoyed this academic side step. Next post will be on finding arguments for your case, or how to brainstorm effectively.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/structure/#respondSun, 01 Jul 2012 07:32:56 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=479Now you know how to make solid arguments, the next step is to organize them in a sensible way that will make sense to your audience and at the same time will optimally support your case. I will deal with the first part here and discuss the latter in a follow up article on structure and logic.

There are many type of structures you can use in a debate or presentation, but one of the most powerful and popular structures in debating is: Problem, Solution, Consequences. This structure is great for policy or proposal style debates and can also be used for utilitarianismor consequentialism style moral debates. It is a structure every debater should master and use before you start experimenting with other structures. The elements are as follows:

Problem: Easy enough, every debate should start with a problem, you’re trying to solve. For example, there’s a nuclear threat in Iran, Democracy is under fire in the Ukraine, or excessive use of alcohol by Dutch teens is causing social issues. The purpose of stating the problem is twofold. First it’s used as a means of introduction, in order to explain why we’re having this debate. Secondly it is meant to justify that we are having a debate on this subject, in other words, that it’s a relevant debate. You’d think this is a no-brainer and most of the times, thankfully, it is, but it does happen that you find yourself in a debate wondering: ‘what on earth is the issue here’. In competitive debating defining the problem is also meant to ensure that the issue is not too niche and small as to create an unfair disadvantage. If it isn’t a generally accepted problem (because for example no one knows about it), then it’s considered an unfair topic to debate on.

Now many people mistakenly believe that when justifying having the debate, you need to have an actual problem that can be solved in some way. Especially when debating judges are instructed to look for this particular structure when evaluating a speech. This is not the case. You could also propose an improvement over the status quo that doesn’t involve an immediate problem. The point is to show that the debate itself is relevant, improving people’s lives, for example, even though there’s no immediate problem can be just as relevant. Moral debates, of a consequential nature, are another instance where this structure can be used but the problem doesn’t need to be a problem per se. For example if I want to debate gay marriage, then I will claim that Gay’s not having the right to marry is a problem. However, there are enough people that do not consider this a problem at all. As such holding on to a strict definition of ‘problem’ could cause problems of itself. Better is to say we need to define an issue and show that it is a relevant issue that warrants a debate.

As it is meant as your introduction, the purpose is to grab your audience’s attention so they’ll want to listen to your case. It is not supposed to turn into a debate in and of itself (on whether there’s an actual problem). So keep it short, clear and interesting. I’ve seen too many people spend more than 50% of their time explaining the problem and why it’s imperative that we do something about it, only to really superficially go over the proposed solution and arguments. Also make sure it’s clear. You don’t want people to still be thinking about what your problem is exactly when they are supposed to be listening to your awesome arguments. And lastly make sure you grab your audience’s attention. I will delve deeper into that when discussing Pathos, but for now make sure you add some drama or other emotional or sensory component (ie make it visible) in order to get people’s attention.

Solution: This is in essence your case. And is the proposed way to deal with the relevant issue at hand. Here it is important you mention this first after your introduction. You’d think this to be obvious, but I’ve seen too many people making a complicated opening, jumping right to the arguments and then halfway through their speech going “and that is why we propose to do x,y,z” leaving the audience completely confused.

Also make sure it is completely clear what you are proposing. If your audience doesn’t fully understand what you are proposing, than they have nothing to connect your arguments to. As such your arguments become useless as the relevance of them also becomes unclear (see refutation ) Make sure that any words used in defining your solution are unambiguous. For example, suppose your solution to the Iranian nuclear threat is to attack them. Although that seems quite clear, there’s world of difference in the way you can attack a country which would yield completely different debates and require different arguments. For example, you could make tactical strikes on their nuclear facilities, you could assassinate nuclear scientists, you could have a full scale invasion, or you could even nuke them. Each would give you a different debate. As such you need to clearly define what you are proposing. Again the pitfall is that you spend too much time on this, so be crystal clear, but also short. You want as much time for your arguments as possible. Also here I’ve seen many, many examples of people spending too much time on explaining their solution. I should know, I’ve made the mistake myself on more than one occasion, especially when it involves a complex issue.

A crucial part of the solution is the implementation, or how you are going to realize your solution. Basically these are the answers to the W questions: who, what, where, when, with what means. This is a very important and often underestimated part of a policy debate. You could have a wonderful plan with lovely positive benefits in theory, but if the implementation, or lack thereof, ensures these benefits never materialize or that the negative side effects outweigh the benefits, than you’re basically out of luck and will lose. Now the problem with explaining the implementation of your plan is that it can potentially take up your whole speech. When above I’m talking about not spending too much time on your solution, this is the part I’m talking about. Nevertheless, the implementation is often where the ‘holes’ in your case reside and you can bet your opponent will look at implementation first in order to find ‘negative consequences’ to your case.

The solution is to go over the W questions in your preparation and think of what potential attacks the opposition can launch against your solution. Then determine what the essential details of the plan are to make sure your audience will know what you are going to do and will believe that it is achievable, then spend some time pre-emptively plugging some holes, you know your opponents will try to exploit and leave it with that. Anything else you keep in your back pocket, just in case it becomes an issue. This way you maintain a balance between on the one hand building a rock solid case and on the other hand spending too much time on it so you don’t have time for your arguments. This is a very difficult balance to strike and will require experience to master.

One of the dilemma’s in competitive debating is that not all debates are policy debates and implementation heavy debates tend to favor the opposition, as it is always easier to attack something than to build something. For example, for a couple of years, every UN debate would end up with the opposition saying: “China and Russia will never agree, so it’s impossible”. This would make for very boring debates. The solution was to move away from pure play policy debates and make the debates more moral. So instead of proposing an actual solution, one would propose a course of action we ‘should’ take and argue why we should do it, not whether or not the solution will actually solve anything in real life. In these cases and in moral cases in general, the point of implementation then becomes to show it is academically possible. E.g. colonizing the sun is academically not possible, Mars could be under certain circumstances. This puts much less pressure on implementation, but still makes it important in the sense that you will always need to mitigate certain negative consequences of your plan and implementation is the way to do it.

Consequences: These are your arguments, the pro’s and cons of your case. I will delve more into this when discussing, argument discovery, or finding arguments. But for now it is important to look at the positive and negative consequences of your plan. The positive consequences are the arguments supporting your case. The negative consequences are your opponent’s arguments and the ones you need to pre-empt or have an answer ready for (there not that important, they’re mitigated, they do not outweigh the benefits, etc.).

When looking at consequences, look at short term and long term consequences. Look at different type of consequences: economic, social, legal, moral, environmental, etc. Lastly, look at who’s impacted by your solution and what the consequences are for them.

In moral debates you will also look at other aspects that are not consequences itself. For example, you will look at moral principles being violated, moral right, etc. But don’t forget about consequences in ethical debates as well. Although utilitarianism and consequentialism are highly contested moral frameworks, the reason they’re still so popular is that they are simple and work effectively in a lot of instances. As such you can use positive consequences as support for your moral case with the utilitarian premise that whatever course of action brings more benefits (happiness) than costs (pain/misery) is morally just.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/refutation/#respondSun, 17 Jun 2012 10:41:26 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=469Refutation is an important part of debating. You need not only to present your own case convincingly, but also help the audience point out the flaws in your opponent’s case. This is the purpose of refutation. In order to be efficient in refutation you can also use the SEXI model as a guide. This model and the logic behind it provides 5 avenues of potential refutation that you can use:

1) Refuting the logic: The first avenue is to check whether the EXplanation logically leads to the Statement. In other words whether the premises logically lead to the conclusion your opponent wants to make. You can expect this to be the case in the majority of cases, but nevertheless you need to be aware of the potential use of a logical fallacy, or faulty logic. I will delve deeper into logical fallacies in a separate article, but for now it is important to know where problems with logic often lie. Faulty logic in speeches often lies with the use of hidden/implicit premises. In a speech one rarely explicates all required premises, but instead only use the premise that answers the “why” question. This is because in spoken language this sounds strange and overcomplicated. So if we take the classic example of Aristotle is mortal, than in a speech one would only say: “Aristotle is mortal, because he is merely human”. You wouldn’t continue explaining that all humans are mortal. This is implicit in the reasoning and is not mentioned explicitly because it is commonly known and would sound kind of strange if said. In most cases this poses no problem, because the implicit logic is a generally accepted premise and an obvious logical step that has to be taken, but where logic goes awry, it is often because an implicit premise is either not generally accepted, or not at all obvious. Take the following example: “A creator brought the universe into existence, because the universe didn’t come into existence out of nothing, as nothing comes from nothing.” Whether you agree with the premises or not, at first sight this argument appears logically sound. However, if we make the hidden premise explicit, we see that there is a logical flaw behind this line of argument: “Either a Creator brought the universe into existence, or the universe came into existence out of nothing.” This is a typical hidden premise that isn’t mentioned as it is considered an obvious logical step. However, it actually contains a false dilemma, there is a third alternative, the option that the universe has existed from eternity. This logical fallacy, a false dilemma, is hidden due to the fact that one premise is not explicated. By making that premise explicit, you can successfully refute the logic of the argument.

2) Refuting the premises: This leads us to the second avenue of refutation, attacking the premises, or the EXplanation. Every argument, as seen above, has explicit and implicit or hidden premises all of which can be challenged on their validity. An argument can be logically sound, but if one of its premises is false, than the argument itself is false or weakened.

3) Refuting the evidence: If refuting the premises itself is difficult, then one can look at the evidence supporting the EXplanation and seek to refute that. This can be done by showing the evidence to be false, to be inconclusive or to provide counterevidence.

The first three avenues have a clear link with the SEXI model. The last two relate more to the structure of a speech, or how the arguments support the motion. If we look at the motion as a statement and the individual arguments as EXplanation or premises, than this opens up some further avenues:

4) Attacking the relevance: The first is attacking the “logic” of your argumentation structure. In the same way as true premises must lead to a true conclusion or Statement, so must true arguments lead to your motion/case being true. However, in some cases the arguments can be perfect, but their truth does not lead to the truth of your motion. In that case the arguments are irrelevant. If you can show this to be the case, then an argument is instantly made ineffective. Needless to say this doesn’t happen very often, but it does occur.

5) Providing a counterargument: This leaves us with the last avenue. Even if an argument is solid and relevant, then there is still a way to refute by providing a counter argument. The reason this can be used comes from the fact that a debate is only rarely about the objective truth or falsity of a case. Often it is about policy, ethics or cases where the objective truth cannot be ascertained (criminal trials). In those cases the truth of an argument doesn’t lead to the truth of the case, but provides a reason to prefer your case over another. These debates are like virtual scales where each argument is a weight on a particular side. The side with most weights wins. In those instances providing a counterargument simply provides a counter reason why this case shouldn’t be preferred. Or in the case of a criminal trial, why it is unlikely that the suspect is guilty.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/lacking-evidence/#respondSat, 16 Jun 2012 23:24:45 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=465One of the questions I often get is what to do when you don’t have any evidence ready and whether it makes sense to make some evidence up in that case. Well, let me be honest, in a lot of cases you can get away with making up evidence as long as it is about an obscure subject that not a lot of people know about. So if you give a made up example of the political outlook of the Ogoni tribe in Nigeria then chances are people will believe it, why wouldn’t they? Especially if it matches perfectly with your EXplanation.

The same is the case with statistics. You can easily make up a statistic, or manipulate statistics so that they give the result you want. That’s really not that difficult. This has however led to many people being quite skeptical about statistics and obscure evidence. The reason being that they cannot check the validity, or relate it to anything they do know.

This also brings us to the danger of providing false evidence. If you use it there is always a chance someone in your audience will know it’s not true and even if they can’t then you also run the risk of someone Googling it at home. The result is that you might win that particular debate, or not even that if you are really unlucky, but that afterwards you are found out and your reputation is shot to pieces. This could have serious consequences for your Ethos and subsequently your ability to convince people in next debates. Why would people ever trust your evidence again? Although truth be told, enough politicians even seem to get away with that.

But what does this teach us on how to present your evidence? Suppose you provide evidence to support your argument, but the opposition claims it is false or incorrect evidence and puts forward some other evidence. How will your audience be able to decide which evidence is in fact correct? The clue lies in the fact that it is so easy to lie with evidence. As a result of that your audience wants to get the feeling they can check whether it is true or not. In order to appeal to that desire you can do two things. First always provide details. It’s more difficult to lie with details, as they have a tendency to get mixed up. So when you provide a lot of details, it gives the impression you really know what you are talking about and thus it must be true. Secondly details give more opportunities to check whether it is true, even if that is after the debate. So by providing more details than your opponent, you could tip the balance towards your piece of evidence. However, providing more details costs time and could make your argument more complex. This could actually reduce the overall persuasiveness of your case, so keep that in mind.

So what to do when you don’t have any evidence? My advice would be not to make up evidence, but to focus more on the EXplanation. Make sure your EXplanation seems sensible to your audience by making sure it’s clear, logical and understandable, but most importantly appeals to mechanics, assumptions, lines of reasoning your audience already believes or finds plausible. The purpose of evidence is on the one hand to support your premises and on the other hand to make your EXplanation more tangible by providing an illustration. If you use premises that your audience find plausible and present them in such a way that they are as tangible as possible, then you can very well get away with providing any form of evidence. Your audience will subconsciously provide the evidence themselves.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/evidence-illustrate/#respondTue, 01 May 2012 20:38:35 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=455The last part of a SEXI argument is the illustration, or better said the evidence supporting your EXplanation. Here too time limits what you can do. The idea here is not to try to be too scientific, but to try to be convincing, or as scientific as possible given the time constraints.

There are a couple of sources of evidence you can use:

Inductive evidence:

Examples

Statistics

Analogy (example of a different situation that shows parallels to the one you’re trying to evidence)

Deductive evidence:

Theories

Evidence from authority:

Expert opinion

Expert sources with certain opinions or facts

The above list is pretty much self-explanatory, but a couple of things could use some additional explanation. Why is an example so powerful you might think. The reason is that although a single example is hardly scientific evidence, it nevertheless shows you that your EXplanation does occur in real life. At the same time the example also gives a more descriptive illustration, contrary to for example statistics which are simply dry numbers. So psychologically an example, or more examples, that illustrate your EXplanation can be very powerful. To see examples at work, look at just any business book, or self-help book and see them at work. Every theory, or argument, is always followed by a vivid example of a company or person that became successful by adhering to that theory. It makes the theory more real, more tangible, than if you would just present dry numbers and facts and that is the power of examples.

An analogy is, as described, an example of a different situation that shows parallels to the one you’re trying to evidence. For example, suppose you’re trying to support the argument that decriminalization of cannabis will decrease crime. You’re having trouble finding examples or statistics that support that fact, so you look at parallel cases. One favorite analogy is then the abolishment of the prohibition on alcohol in the USA and the resulting decline in crime it had. It has the same mechanism, or EXplanation, as with cannabis, being that a popular/social accepted substance that is banned leads to a high demand for it in the illegal circuits, resulting in a rise in crime. If it is subsequently decriminalized, then crime will drop as legal alternatives will become more popular. Obviously this parallel has its flaws and this is the danger of an analogy, for the opposition will try to show that the differences make the analogy useless as evidence. But nevertheless if you’re lacking in powerful examples to support your case, because it is a new plan that hasn’t been implemented anywhere for example, then analogies are very useful.

If we look at deductive evidence, theories, than what is meant is that we use the scientific evidencing someone else has done and use it as a short cut to support our argument. The difficulty is that it only works if your audience is familiar with your theory and accepts it, or if you’re able to explain the essence of it in a very short time frame. This is often a problem in debates. One popular line of moral argumentation uses the theory of justice by John Rawls, specifically the concept of the ‘veil of ignorance‘ to support certain fairness arguments. In university debating this concept is often well understood by the jury, but outside that context it is often hard to explain given limited time. So although useful, use this type of evidence with care

Evidence from authority can also be useful when needing to support arguments, because you use the reputation and work done by that person, without having to go into detail. Again this saves valuable time. Crucial here is that the authority is accepted by your audience as an authority and that the expert opinion is based on some kind of scientific research, or life long experience. Using a famous movie star as evidence, might work for commercials, but hardly ever for debates. Also make sure your authority is accepted as unbiased by your audience.

Next post will delve deeper into how to present your evidence and whether it makes sense to lie about your evidence.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/reasoning-and-reasons/#respondMon, 23 Apr 2012 21:24:20 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=427Next to being logically sound, your reasons, or EXplanation, needs to make sense to the people you’re trying to convince. This can often be tricky as time constraints do not allow you to fully work out an argument. In order to work around this you have to appeal to reasons that your public accepts, or at least is familiar with. If you do this, then the burden of further supporting your argument will be less, than when you appeal to reasons that your public doesn’t accept at first hand. The expalantion is simple if your public accepts a reason or is familiar with that particular reasoning, then they will automatically fill in the blanks so to speak and complete the argument for you. This way you don’t have to explain your statement and then continue explaining your explanation.

The advice is thus, know your audience. More specifically know their belief system. A belief system is the network of interrelated beliefs that a person has that collectively makes sense of how that person beliefs the world is. In philosophical terms, a belief is a statement of how the world “is”. In an ideal case these interrelated beliefs support each other, but often not all of them do. If you know a person’s belief system, then you can appeal to those beliefs and immediately have much of their belief system helping you subconsciously to support your argument.

Take an easy example. Suppose you are talking to a socialist public about progressive income tax systems. If you then argue that a progressive tax system is fair, then your audience will subconsciously add their whole conceptual framework of fairness to your argument, without you having to. If on the other hand your trying to convince hard-core republicans that a progressive tax system is fair, then you will need to upset their entire belief system, which will be hard work.

What to do then if you’re faced with an audience that doesn’t support your line of reasoning at first hand. In that case you try to appeal to another belief in their belief system and show them how that belief actually supports your argument. In this way you use the fact that almost no belief systems people have fully justify each other. But make no mistake, this will still be very difficult, because people will try to keep their belief system intact. This will require you considering their emotions and Ego as well, but that is where Pathos comes in. At least from a Logos point of view, this will give you a fighting chance.

Suppose you are trying desperately to sell your progressive tax system to your republican audience. In order to do that you need to appeal to some belief that they hold. For example, that hard work should be rewarded. If you can then establish that although the market assigns value to work in an optimal way, this nonetheless results in some hard work not being fully rewarded, then you have your foot in the door so to speak. It’s still going to be very difficult, but again at least you have a fighting chance.

So the recipy for being able to use the right reasoning to support your arguments is making sure you know your audience well. But what if you don’t know your audience, or your audience is very mixed, what type of reasons do you then use? In that case the 17th century philosopher John Locke gives some advice. He argues that there are 4 generic types of acceptable reasons one can give with the first being most convincing and the last being the least convincing:

Now we have to see this through the eyes of someone from the 17th century who still believed that the natural siences provide us with objective irrefutable certainty. Although the natural laws have become less credible then they once were, its still a pretty safe bet people will accept those as valid reasons, with the obvious exception of evolutionairy arguments in certain religious circles.

As we move down the list chances become less that your audience will accept them. However, if those reasons DO appeal to your audience’s belief system, then they can be as powerful as natural laws. An audience filled with UFO spotters (personal experience), will often accept the existence of alien life on our planet over natural laws. The same goes for an audience filled with victims of violent crimes. Good luck convincing them that statistics show violent crime is down.

Nevertheless this list does give you some handle on the type of reasons you can use and their ‘objective’ force in a debate. Scientific laws are more ‘objective’ than personal experience and thus more likely to be accepted by your audience. But in the end knowing your audience and appealing to their belief system is more powerful.

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http://www.marcroels.nl/the-logic-of-sexi/#respondFri, 13 Apr 2012 18:03:44 +0000http://www.marcroels.nl/?p=413The SEXI template is based on theories of informal logic and it helps to understand the model by making a small forray into the theory of logic.

Logic postulates certain certain reasoning structures, that when all supporting premises are true, the conclusion must invariably be true as well. A classic example is:

Conclusion: “Aristoteles is mortal”
Premise: “Aristotle is a man”
Premise: “All men are mortal”

As will be clear a conclusion can be translated into the S from our SEXI model, while a premise is an EX. In logical formulation, using our SEXI model it writes:

S: A = C
EX 1: A = B
EX 2: All B = C

It’s easy to see that when EX 1 and EX 2 are both true, then S must necessarily be true as well. This check on whether an argument is logical is important. For example take the following reasoning:

Although this reasoning makes sense, it is logically invalid for the reason that other causes could have led to the streets being wet. Looking at the logical formulation shows where it goes wrong:

S: A
EX 1: B
EX 2: A => B (the arrow reads as ” then”)

As this shows you can conclude from the fact that it has rained that the streets must be wet, but not the other way round.

There are many theories and schemata’s that can tell you whether an argument is valid. It’s a bit too much to deal with in a simple blog, but it does show you the importance of EX. EX not only provides the reasoning behind your conclusion, but also provides the logical validation of your argument.

Why then do we need to have I when we already have a logically conclusive argument. The answer is that logic only determines that a conclusion must be true if the explanation is true. It doesn’t say anything about the validity of the explanation itself. In theory every EX can become its own S which then needs tovbe explained by its own EX. This can go on ad infinitum becoming ever more difficult to prove and at the same time more absurd as you go deeper. This is the stuff philosphers love to do and especially sceptics, as they will point out that at some point you cannot prove anything anymore.

However, from a practical point of view we do not need to go so deep. Assuming we all accept a general basis for accepting evidence, we can shortcut this endless string of reasoning by providing some empirical evidence. This is called inductive reasoning, compared to the deductive reasoning used above. By providing some empirical evidence on top of an explantion, be provide evidence that our explantion is not only logical, but also true. Together, as we have seen above, true and logically sound explanations must lead to a true conclusion.

That in short is some background on the logical basis of the SEXI model. Next we will look at what kinds of evidence can be used and how this logical expose can help you refute arguments of your opponent.

There are good arguments, bad arguments and arguments that aren’t arguments at all. To begin with the last category, often people will state an opinion thinking this to be an argument. For example in a debate about abortion, someone can say: “I believe abortion to be immoral” and think they are giving an argument. What they are in fact giving is a statement, or an opinion. What then makes an argument an argument? An argument is a statement that is supported by some sort of justification as to why the statement is true or valid. In the simplest form this justification takes the form of an answer to the question “why?”. So when someone gives the argument that abortion is immoral, instead of just a statement, then they have to answer the implicit question why abortion is immoral. Such an argument can look like this: Abortion is immoral as it constitutes the murder of a living being. Whether or not you agree with this argument is besides the point. The point is that this is the start of a proper argumentation, instead of merely stating an opinion.

Recipe for a solid argument

What then makes for a solid argument? Well a solid argument needs to be SEXI, which stands for:

S: State

EX: Explain

I: Illustrate (Evidence)

State is the conclusion of your argument, it is that which the rest of the ingredients of the argument try to prove. Ideally, the statement is short, clear and unambiguous. The reason it needs to be short is that you will need all of your available time proving your statement and thus do not want to waste that on explaining the point you’re trying to make. Second the statement needs to be clear. Your audience needs to know exactly what your argument is. Don’t leave them guessing, therefore as a rule you mention the statement/conclusion of your argument first. Don’t bother with a separate introduction, that will be both too long and will have a big risk of making it unclear where you want to go to, or what you are trying to prove. Lastly make sure all the words in your statement are unambiguous. Make sure the terms used are clear, but also make sure the statement itself is clear. For example, is Abortion immoral or not? And if it is only immoral in certain circumstances, make those circumstances explicit from the outset. Don’t keep your audience guessing, they might misinterpret what you are trying to prove. Try to keep your statement limited to one sentence only.

Explain is, as the term suggests, the explanation why your statement/conclusion is true. This is also called your reasoning, some people call it analysis. In terms of formal logic this is where you set out the premises that necessarily lead to your statement/conclusion. The main tip here would be to be as thorough as possible given the context of your speech. Most often people skimp on this part, while it is arguably the most important part. This is the logic/reasoning supporting your argument and this should be robust, well thought through and most of all logical. The biggest mistake people make is presuming the audience already knows all the reasoning supporting the statement. They often don’t resulting in you making intellectual leaps that your audience simply cannot follow. I will go deeper into this part in my next post, but for now remember that your explanation needs to be logically valid and robust.

The last part is illustrates and that is the evidence supporting your argument or reasoning. The reason this is called ‘illustrate’ is that when speeching the use of an example supporting your argument is often the most efficient and powerful evidence that you can use. Nevertheless there are all sorts of evidence you can use to support your argument and every good argument should have some sort of evidence backing up your logical reasoning. Given that you normally have limited time, there are limits to the depth of evidencing you can give (the same goes for explaining), you need to be efficient in this. Use examples, statistics or for example analogies to quickly support your point. You are not supposed to explain the methodology behind the evidence, nor do you need to be fully scientific about it. It needs to be specific and detailed enough that people can check up on it if they so wish. Being able to check your evidence is what will make your evidence convincing instead of something you just made up. I will go further into evidencing in a future post.

Together these three ingredients will make a solid argument. This is a much used structure for argumentation and one that has proven its effectiveness. Just look at business literature or political magazines. They all use this structure. Take the example of business literature. For example they will state that by focusing on shareholder value a company will improve long term profitability. They then explain this by setting out their theory. For example that by focusing on shareholder value management is forced to focus on the bottom line, which will lead them to focus more on profitable endeavors and cost cutting, which in term drive profitability of the company. They then often end with an example of several companies that have implemented this shareholder value and were able to outperform their peers. A clear example of a SEXI argument.

Before I go into the means of persuasion it is important to distinguish between types of persuasion. In the Dutch language both are called “overtuigen”, but the English language makes a difference between to persuade and to convince. The main difference is that convincing is aimed more at showing you are right at the expense of someone else, who has to be wrong, as it comes from the Latin meaning ‘to conquer’, while persuasion comes from the Latin meaning ‘to seduce’. In other words, when persuading someone, you are ‘seducing’ that person to your standpoint using much more softer methods. This way of getting people to agree with you is often used in 1 on 1 discussions, advertisements, sales and of course seduction itself. Convincing on the other hand is aimed at showing your position is stronger that the other’s position, often using harder methods. This type is often used in debates, US court cases and 1 on 1 discussion, though the latter will often be much more heated.

In general, ‘convincing’ is more effective when trying to convince a third party to choose your position over an opponent’s, while ‘persuasion’ is more effective when directly trying to persuade someone of your position. If you try to convince someone in a direct discussion, then you try to do so showing the other is ‘wrong’, which is often not effective as they will try to defend their ego and put up an emotional blockage. On the other hand when you persuade someone, you seduce them to your position, which does not lead to a loss in the other’s eyes. On the other hand if you try to seduce your audience, while being attacked by your opponent, you are far less effective, when you don’t actively defend your position against his of her attacks.

In the end context determines which mode is most effective, but both methods use the same tools of persuasion, they just apply them differently. I will use the terms persuasion and convincing here interchangeably as the tools are the same, but keep in mind the subtle difference between the two in terms of application.

Means of persuasion

According to Aristoteles there are three main methods of persuasion:

Ethos

Pathos

Logos

Ethos is convincing people by means of establishing your credibility as an objective expert, or as someone with a reputable character. Convincing with Ethos is done by gaining acceptance of the audience, gaining their trust and establishing your credibility. Gaining acceptance is best explained by creating some kind of rapport with your audience, or in other words making them like you in a way that will lead them to accept your message more than that of your opponent. Gaining their trust is all about ensuring people will accept you as an expert, or someone who’s opinion counts as an opinion that is worthy listening to and worthy of consideration. Lastly establishing credibility has as a goal to ensure that your audience believes your message and more importantly believes that you are objective and not likely of misleading them for your own purpose. The reason being that people are often unable to fully check the facts of your message.

Pathos is persuading people by means of appealing to their emotions, fears, desires and by presenting your case in an appealing and convincing way. Persuading by means of pathos is all about ensuring a connection with the audience and ensuring the message is more attractive than your opponent’s. This starts by presenting your case in an appealing way, which means making sure you appeal to all the senses of your audience including their emotions. No one wants to hear a boring listing of arguments and facts instead people like stories, anecdotes, visualizations, heartfelt appeals, etc. This will not only lead audiences to accepting your message more, but will also make your message easier to remember. Charisma as a speaker and being able to speak with passion about a subject also helps in this respect. Lastly you need to appeal to the audience’s fears, desires and needs. This will ensure you get their attention, as it makes a message instantly relevant and important. If you can show your position will fulfill their desires and take away their fears than will want your position to be true as it will make their lives better.

Logos is convincing people by means of using argument, reasoning and evidence in order to support your position. You convince people with logos by making clear logical argument, that are supported by solid evidence. The arguments themselves are organized in your speech in a clear and structured way. The most boring of the three, but nevertheless the most important of the three. Without logos, yo have no content and without content your speech will be vacuous. No murderer will be sentenced without some form of evidence, no-one will be follow you merely on your reputation. That reputation needs to be baked up with knowledge, arguments and smart reasoning. Much literature provides evidence that in the end logos is not very important in convincing people, showing facts that non-verbal communication (pathos) is more important than verbal communication for example. This is true, but doesn’t make logos any less important. You should look logos as a hygiene requirement for persuasion. You need to have it, or in other words you should have done your homework. This doesn’t mean people want to hear everything you know, but it does mean that when challenged on it, you need to be able to respond effectively and show evidence where this is needed.

In the end the most effective way of persuasion uses all three methods in unison putting emphasis on one over the other based on the context. In an academic context, Logos will be more important, while when giving a rallying speech, Pathos is much more important. I will delve deeper into each of these three in following articles.

Debating is a formalised discussion with the purpose of convincing a third party by means of arguments.

Convincing a third part: In debating, in contrast to discussing, it is not the goal to convince one another. Only very rarely will one witness a debater acknowledging that the other person is right. Instead, the debaters try to convince a third party that their arguments are better than the arguments of their opponents. This third party can be: the voter, the audience, coalition parties, or in the case of competitive debating, a jury. Take the example of presidential debates in the US. You will never see a candidate acknowledging that the other candidate has the better arguments. Instead the focus their efforts on convincing the voter. Not each other, for they know that it’s pointless

Formalised: A debate is simply a discussion with rules. These rules always include the amount of time a debater has, what is permissible during the debate and rules concerning interruptions. The rules concerning what is permissible concerning simple etiquette, but also regulate the kind of arguments allowed. For example, personal attacks are almost never allowed, nor discriminatory or sexist remarks. Regarding interruptions: in some cases interruptions are not allowed, sometimes the debater has to give permission and in other cases the chair of the debate has to give permission.

In competitive debating the rules also include what the roles of each debater is in the debate. For instance, the first speaker on a proposition side is supposed to outline a case. If he or she doesn’t perform this elemental duty, then the debate will be very messy indeed. Also the last speakers on each side, are almost always obliged to give a summary of the debate. Competitive debating also has rules on what is considered fair in a debate. These rules include the permissibility rules outlined above, but also regulate what kind of cases are fair and, for example, that new arguments are not allowed in the summary.

Types of debates:

There are roughly three generic types of debates:

“House of commons”: these debates have a comparable set-up as the debates in the British ‘House of commons’, but different rules. In these debates two groups face each other like in parliament. Two versions then exist. In the first version, popularized on dutch television, every debater is allowed to choose his own position on a subject. In the second version the two groups represent teams, which have to defend a certain side of an issue. In both cases debaters may make a point by standing up and waiting until the debate-moderator gives the ‘the word’. They are then allowed to give one argument, ask one question, or make a single remark.

Parliamentary debating: these debates have rules based on the rules governing debates in the British ‘House of commons’, but have a very different set-up. Three versions of this style exist. In American parliamentary two teams of two people each have to defend a side of an issue. The proposing team is aptly called ‘the government’ and the opposing team is called ‘the opposition’. In Australian parliamentary style, two teams consisting of three persons have to defend a certain side of an issue. The last style, which is also the style which is used during the World and European championships is British Parliamentary style. In British parliamentary style, four teams consisting of two people compete against each other. Two of the teams have to defend an issue and two teams have to oppose. The two teams on one side have to work together, but at the same time, have to outperform each other. This resembles the often difficult situation that coalition parties are in. In all versions of parliamentary debating debaters speak for a pre determined amount of time. Often between 4 and 8 minutes each. During these speeches, it is allowed to give interruptions. This is done by standing up and asking the speaker for permission. If the speaker allows it, then the interruptor is allowed to give one point, or ask one question. The speaker is not forced to accept interruptions, but in general has to allow at least 1 or 2.

Cross examination: in these debates two debaters interact directly with each other for a pre determined amount of time. During this time debaters may freely interrupt each other. Etiquette often determines that the debaters have to let each other speak, but often debaters try speak as much as possible. It is the most dynamic, but also the most messy style of debating. Only rarely is it done in its pure form. More often it is used in combination with one of the other types of debating. This style is used competitively in the US and is also popular on television.